Sunday, September 05, 2010

Weekender

IF YOU ONLY BUY ONE RECORD THIS WEEK...
Summer Camp are Jeremy Warmsley and Elizabeth Sankey. It's important to mention this off the bat as every single review has felt duty bound to go on about secretive groups in general well before the primary purpose of telling you what the music's like. Look there, they've now done gigs and photoshoots and everything, they're hardly the Residents. And now they've got a six track EP out, Young, which in some quarters has seen them filed as complicit in 2010's other growth economy, chillwave, but is nothing of the sort. It's basically a warped pop record about youth, nostalgia and consequent loss of innocence built on wipe-clean synth production that knows evoking the 80s is about more than pretending you're Vince Clarke, not careful at all with its sources. Where they go next will be fascinating. Where they've gone now, likewise.

SOMEWHERE TO GO
Horse The Van fired up again, cymbals cowering for their lives, Sky Larkin are getting round to touring Kaleide, a good length journey starting in Brighton on Friday - full dates here. If you like your rock'n'roll a bit more amped up heavy and garagey, your venues a little more heaving and smashed up and your drumkits that much more redistributed and set alight, Monotonix sprint, climb and dive across the country in advance of an Albini-recorded album due out in January - Brighton Volks Monday, London Camp Tuesday, Leicester Musician Wednesday, Sheffield Plug Thursday, Bristol Croft Friday.

BANDS START UP EACH AND EVERY DAY
The Sailplanes have been around for two or three years already but they have a new EP available free from their site. Describing the approach as "toning down the abrasive sounds, and concentrating more on playing our fucking instruments", it's not too far from the post-punk with extra spiky, awkward bits that we've been talking about before in relation to Love Ends Disaster!, but similarly in thrall to the frictionless rhythmic bloc of Life Without Buildings via the ever present Sonic Youth and the Raincoats' poised clatter.

THERE'S ALWAYS A FESTIVAL SOMEWHERE
End Of The Road time again, always a great occasion with fine clientele and more than enough special to carry the musical side through comfortably. Headliners are Modest Mouse, Yo La Tengo and Wilco, also in the list are Edwyn Collins, the Mountain Goats, Caribou, Allo Darlin', Steve Mason, Brakes, Jonquil, Monotonix, Smoke Fairies, The Low Anthem, Eagleowl, Three Trapped Tigers, Errors, Pulled Apart By Horses (clerical error?), Left With Pictures, Mountain Man, Iron & Wine, The New Pornographers, the Unthanks, Adam Green, Felice Brothers, Wolf Parade, Black Mountain, Philip Selway, the Antlers, Woodpigeon, Diane Cluck and the Ruby Suns. Meursault and Darren Hayman are also playing, but only on the Thursday for early camping arrivals. There's an understandable crossover with the far more easy press-friendly Bestival, although they get the flashier names. Dizzee Rascal, the Prodigy and The Flaming Lips headline, while the rest swings wildly from off-beam - LCD Soundsystem, the XX, Wild Beasts, Fever Ray, Jonsi, the High Llamas, Archie Bronson Outfit, Janelle Morae, Everything Everything, Summer Camp, Beth Jeans Houghton, Four Tet, Sleigh Bells, Washed Out, Beardyman, Yuck, Gaggle - to heritage - Roxy Music, the Wailers, Gil Scott Heron, Chic, Heaven 17, Echo & the Bunnymen, Cornershop, Babybird, Rolf Harris, Level 42 and most famously Howard Jones. More northerly, while we usually shy away from new startups - we remember the stories of Zoo Thousand - we're assured that some good people with level headed plans are behind Headstock, on Saturday at Newstead & Annesley Country Park, Nottingham. Your old favourite descriptive terms for festivals that aren't Sonisphere - "laid back", "family friendly" - are all applied in the official bumph, while Ash, Field Music, Frightened Rabbit, The Beat and the Penguin Cafe Orchestra stand out in the programme. And the most expensive tickets are £30. Harvest at Jimmy's is also next weekend, but we took one look at their site, saw the opening sentence "We are beside ourselves with excitement and very honoured to have the very talented Scouting For Girls live and unleashed", and scarpered. Are they trying to convince themselves?

WHAT ELSE?
Now the BBC seem to have given up on Peel Day, it's left to the web to keep the memory alive. Football And Music are organising a blog/Twitter-wide #keepingitpeel day for 25th October.

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